Folk Bands and Artists
Rokhsan
London
http://www.soundcloud.com/rokhsanmusic
Songwriter, singer and multi-instrumentalist, Rokhsan is the kind of artist whose musical gifts reach straight to our soul, hearts and minds. She is first and foremost a songwriter – whether authentic or figments of her imagination, her songs are as varied and complex as life itself. Whether dipped in Stevie’s Motown soul, splashed with dashes of disco or played intimately on a Steinway piano, she bares her soul raw. Rokhsan possesses the mark of a great songwriter which is that the more personal her material gets, the more universal it feels and resonates with her audience.
Despite a “pop-free” childhood, as she likes to joke, Rokhsan vividly remembers the unexpected and euphoric feeling when, aged 16, she first discovered pop. Brought up between Southern England and Bahrain by a Persian father and an English-Indian mother, Rokhsan reached her mid-teens without ever hearing the charts. “Music was a huge part of my childhood, but not pop music,” she explains. “My parents listened to Iranian music, Whitney Houston and occasionally Mariah Carey. My dad played piano, Tar (a 6 stringed instrument) and Tombak (a drum). I started piano lessons aged six. I longed to learn drums but I wasn’t allowed a drum kit so I’d bang pots and pans.”
